


The Devil's Details

by MangoMartini



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Infidelity, M/M, Masturbation, Phone Sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-29
Updated: 2016-01-29
Packaged: 2018-05-17 02:49:36
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,159
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5851270
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MangoMartini/pseuds/MangoMartini
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Lestrade and Moriarty have an arrangement: they meet up for drinks every few months, exchange information, and part ways. It's a good arrangement, even better because Moriarty is paying Lestrade, at least until Moriarty stumbles across some information Lestrade didn't want to know.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Devil's Details

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Belladonna_Q](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Belladonna_Q/gifts).



> The lovely BelladonnaQ mentioned that she wanted a Jimstrade fic, so I tried my hand at one. Ten bucks says there will be a sequel fic to this, but for now I wanted to get this part posted. Hope it's what you wanted!

The hotel bar is too dim and expensive for Greg’s taste, so he sips at his whiskey, trying to find the balance between _comfortable_ and _drunk_. But the more he drinks, the more it seems as if the answer is at the bottom of the glass. It’s expensive whiskey. He knows that, and normally he wouldn’t indulge like this. Normally he doesn’t indulge at all. But this is a special occasion, and the burn down the back of his throat helps him forget that even in his suit, he still looks laughably out of place. It’s an awareness that pricks at the back of his neck, makes his scalp tingle like it’s covered in a hundred abrasive stares.

“You’re early,” a voice purrs into his ear, and it’s only after years of practice that Greg doesn’t jump. 

Because even after years of meeting with him, Greg still hasn’t adjusted to James Moriarty. There was something about the small man, with his slicked bar hair tailored suits, and the way he smiled at you like he knew every fear you ever had, and every fear you ever would have. Or maybe it was just that he bribed Greg regularly for information about Scotland Yard. Whichever it is, it makes Greg sit up straighter and tighten his grasp on his glass. 

“And you need a bloody bell.” It’s an old, worn-out joke but the familiarity of it is a balm on Greg’s nerves. Even now, everything about this man sets Greg on edge. They both know it--Greg never tried to hide it. 

There’s familiarity in the way that he laughs. “Well,” Moriarty replies, sidling into a seat next to Greg at the bar and waving down the bartender, “if you get me a bell, you’ll need to get me a collar to put it on.”

He must have waited until he saw Greg take a drink, because the comment about the collar comes just as Greg has his glass tilted back, whiskey already in his throat. Greg sputters, chokes on his drink, and he can feel the burn snaking up his nose. Remarks like _that_ still hasn’t gotten familiar. 

Greg watches as Moriarty orders a drink, as he winks at the bartender, and as he slips the bartender a folded up fifty pound note. Whether it’s because the man is young and muscled, or just to keep his silence, Greg doesn’t know. But he knows better than to ask. He finishes his whiskey quickly and decides, like much about his dealing with Moriarty, that he doesn’t want to know. It’s usually better for everyone involved if he doesn’t know. 

Moriarty’s drink arrives, a dirty martini, but he doesn’t drink it. Instead, he stares at Greg like he can read his mind, see under his clothes, and know every move Greg has made since they last saw each other across town four months ago. It, like everything else about Moriarty, had unnerved him at first. Now it is a ritual. The intensity of it is at odds with the plush hotel bar, all gold panels and soft chandelier lights, but there’s no stopping it. 

“With what I pay you,” Moriarty says, picking his drink up just to swirl it around in the glass, “you can afford a better suit. Two better suits, even.” He quirks up a dark, well-manicured eyebrow. “Or is this your subtle way of telling me that I don’t pay you enough?”

“This suit’s fine,” Greg replies, and it’s that comment that finally has Moriarty drinking. 

“A fine dust rag, perhaps.” Moriarty’s eyes light up like glittering black holes. “Or is _that_ why you wore it?” he asks, leaning just a little closer, “in the hope that I might help you throw it on the floor where it belongs?”

He’s close enough so that Greg can smell his cologne. It’s all a part of the game. It’s a part of the game the way the hotel bars, envelopes of money, and furtive whispers are all part of the game. Greg plays coy, Moriarty plays the flirt, and all anyone remembers is two men out on what looks to be a spectacularly bad date. Of course, Greg only knows this after he threatened to cut off their game not six months in. Back then Moriarty had laughed, patted his chest with his hand and assured him that, if Moriarty actually wanted him, he would know. 

That was when Greg decided he was, in almost all matters, better off _not_ knowing. So when Moriarty shifts back in his seat, Greg knows that round two has begun. 

“What do you have for me?” Greg asks, because this is the exception to the rule about knowing. Moriarty called the meeting, and he never before called one so close to the last. Four months is hardly enough time for any information to add up on either end, after all, even in London. And it wasn’t as though Greg hadn’t given Moriarty more than enough last time: two police raid dates and the identity of an undercover prostitute was more than enough to earn what Moriarty paid him. 

Moriarty makes a disapproving noise in the back of his throat, and drops a hand down to Greg’s thigh to press down against the sensitive skin with his sharp nails. Even with the fabric of his trousers, the sensation makes Greg wince. “You know that’s not how this game is played, _detective_.” His words are a harsh whisper, and a reminder that Moriarty has the upper hand--in all respects. Moriarty presses his nails down one more time, not enough to leave a mark but enough to leave an impression, before taking his hand back. “You show me yours, and I’ll show you mine,” he sings softly, before sipping his martini. 

Greg obeys. He can only recount suspicions, potential targets, and the main suspect they have on a murder case. He says it all in a steady, soft voice, being careful that his words won’t carry. Moriarty writes none of it down. But Moriarty does nod, and Greg can feel the endless voids of his eyes drinking in the information into their inescapable atmosphere. 

“Good boy,” Moriarty praises once Greg has finished. He then orders Greg another, different, whiskey because, “I know you always order the cheap stuff, even when you know you won’t be paying for it.”

Of course, the two had always had different ideas about _cheap_. Just look at Moriarty’s watch. Greg’s only ever seen something that nice in advertisements and the evidence locker. 

Then again, everything about Moriarty is nice in a way it shouldn’t be. He looks nice, smells nice, has a voice--when he wants to--like the nicest cello solo Greg has ever heard. It’s the kind of nice that makes Greg glad he’s married, because it all makes Greg really not want to be nice at all. 

“Maybe we should meet up more often,” Moriarty muses, running a finger along the rim of his martini glass. The noise in the hotel bar has picked up some, more couples hovering around them and ordering drinks, tittering to each other. A piano player across the lobby has begun playing, and the notes drift through the bar like debris through space. “You had more for me than I thought you would.”

Greg shrugs it off, sips his new whiskey and doesn’t even try to hide how much more he enjoys the flavor of this one--Moriarty would be able to tell regardless. True to form Moriarty looks smug, like the cat who just bought the canary the best whiskey he had ever had in his life. “You’re the one that called the meeting,” he replies, trying to move the conversation forward if only so Moriarty will stop looking at him like that. 

Moriarty nods slowly, still playing with his glass. “I did. And that’s because I have some rather time-sensitive information for _you_ , darling.” 

Greg lets him speak, sipping at his whiskey to try and hide the fact that Moriarty calling him darling doesn’t make him as uncomfortable as it should. Moriarty lists places where lucrative drug busts might take place, and the home location of a particularly dangerous arms dealer. Greg doesn’t try to take it all in or memorize it--there will be a note slipped into his hand by the end of the night, as usual. _That_ he will commit to memory, and then burn, and then flush the ashes down the toilet. Can’t be too careful. 

“Oh,” Moriarty says, snapping his fingers as if he’s just now remembered it, “and your wife is cheating on you.”

“No.” The word is out of Greg’s mouth before he has even put his glass down. “No,” he repeats, “she’s not.”

There was no way Sharon could be cheating on him. Greg thinks of the last week, how he kissed her every night before bed, how he took her out to dinner Wednesday to that Thai place she loves, how just last night he buried his face between her thighs until she grabbed his hair and demanded that he stop. She wasn’t cheating on him. She couldn’t be. 

Moriarty huffs, as if annoyed that Greg is paying his own thoughts more attention than Moriarty. “Must you have such a _predictable_ reaction?” he asks, rolling his dark eyes. He reaches into the pocket of his suit jacket and takes out a crisp, white, envelope. “The whole thing is so _boring_.”

The envelope rests on the bar, a stark contrast to the hardwood, as if someone had taken an eraser and meticulously scratched out a small, rectangular part of the world. People still came and ordered drinks, the piano kept tinkling out notes, and he himself remained stuck in Moriarty’s gravitational pull, unable to escape, unable to look away from the envelope. 

Greg swallows, wanting to get the bitter taste out of his mouth. “I don’t want to see them,” he says, with more conviction than he actually feels. 

“Are you sure?” Moriarty drawls, quirking up an eyebrow. But Greg doesn’t stop him as he reaches out, picks up the envelope, and pockets it. “Well I have to say this is surprising, my dear. If I had known you didn’t care, I would have kept them until our next meeting.”

Greg just shakes his head, because he’s been an officer long enough to know what just happened. It isn’t about the pictures. Hell, the envelope could be empty, it wouldn’t have made a difference. It’s about an idea, about doubt. Now every time he sees Sharon, every time she can’t answer the phone, every time she cancels their date plans because she has to work lat, Greg will _doubt_. He’ll never be able to trust his wife again. 

And when he blinks, pulls himself out of his own head, Moriarty is smirking again. 

“You’re a right bastard,” Greg informs Moriarty, but it doesn’t change the expression on his face. 

Moriarty does offer a shrug, however. “I’ve been called much worse, I assure you.” With a determined gulp, he finishes his martini. “This is why I hate the truth. People always prefer their little lies.”

In his years working for Moriarty, Greg Lestrade has done a lot of terrible things. He’s tampered with evidence, lied under oath, and even prevented a rapist from being prosecuted (though that man _did_ end up in the Thames with his head cut off, all part of a grand Moriarty scheme). And whether it was the money, the rush, or disfunction with his conscious, Greg never really felt upset about any of it. 

But this is something different. This is his happiness, his _wife_ , the woman he wants (wanted?) to spend the rest of his life with. Sharon kept him grounded, supported him, loved him, and now all Greg would think about when he saw her was _doubt_. She is not part of their game. 

The next few moments pass in a blur. Greg’s vaguely aware of the glass in his hand, of the way he picks up, and the way he tosses its expensive, golden contents right onto the front of Moriarty’s bloody suit. He barely hears the gasps of the people around them as he slams the glass down, too busy focusing on the way Moriarty’s eyes are wide, eyebrows up farther than Greg has ever seen, and the way his mouth is hung open like a gaping wound without a sound coming out of it. 

“Don’t ever call me again,” Greg demands, and storms out of the hotel, into a cab, and doesn’t stop storming until he’s slammed the front door of his flat shut behind him so hard that it rattles the photos on the walls. 

“Greg? Are you alright?”

“Sharon?” Greg calls back, frowning slightly as his wife comes out of the bedroom. She has her hair back, pajamas on and a look on her face that says she was half-asleep before he slammed the door. There’s something in the way she looks, so normal and familiar, that makes Greg want to vomit. Or maybe it’s the whiskey. “Go to bed, love,” he says, the last word tacking itself on to his sentence out of habit. 

Sharon leans against the doorframe and crosses her arms. “Bad day at work?” she asks, and when Greg gives her an apathetic shrug she follows it up with, “Do you want to--”

“No,” Greg replies, wincing when he realizes that it sounds exactly the same as when he said it to Moriarty. “I’m just tired, yeah? Go back to bed and I’ll be there in a minute.”

She does, but she kisses him on the cheek before she goes, and as Greg gets ready for bed he washes his face twice, scrubbing at the spot where she kissed him until the skin is pink and tender. It’s only when he’s in bed, setting his mobile to charge for the night, that it vibrates with an incoming text. 

The text is from Moriarty. 

_You were very rude today, pet_ , the message reads, _but I’m willing to forgive you just this once_.

Greg doesn’t want to reply. He wants to throw his mobile out the window. He doesn’t want to do this here, not under the seafoam green sheets he and Sharon picked out last summer, to go with the curtains she hung up in their bedroom. This place smelled like two-in-one shampoo, gardenia laundry detergent, and home. There shouldn’t be any Moriarty here. 

His mobile vibrates again. _Don’t test me _, is all it reads.__

___My wife is not part of this_ , Greg texts back, settling into bed but still with a hand on his mobile. Next to him, he can hear Sharon’s calm, even breathing. She always was one to fall asleep quickly. _ _

___Don’t tell me how to play my game_. _ _

__Greg makes a face at his phone, even though there’s no one around to see it, but he doesn’t reply. He’s done with this day, with this conversation, with talking to Moriarty until he has to months later. He’s ready for bed._ _

__That’s when his mobile rings, vibrating furiously against the top of the bedside table. The number is blocked, which means Moriarty. Greg grabs at it, afraid the noise will wake Sharon up. That’s not something he wants to explain to her. He presses the button to accept the call, wedges the phone between his ear and the pillow and hopes that this will be enough to stifle the noise._ _

__“Quiet,” Greg says into the receiver, “my wife’s asleep.”_ _

__“And in your bed,” Moriarty replies. “That’s surprising.”_ _

__Greg grinds his teeth, the taste of spearmint toothpaste still fresh on his tongue. “You going to tell me that I’m dead, then?” Greg asks. The words are oddly easy to say, but not nearly as odd as the way Moriarty giggles in response._ _

__“Darling, I think you overestimate how easy it is to pick and groom a member of Scotland Yard. You’ve made yourself too valuable to kill after ruining one suit.” There is a pause, as if Moriarty is thinking. “But you’re not much more valuable than that, so I would watch yourself, if I were you.”_ _

__Even in the dark of the bedroom, Greg can see a way out of this conversation. He can thank Moriarty, say that he won’t mess up again, and that will be that. But there’s a nagging feeling in the pit of his stomach, like his entire lower intestine just tripped and fell into a pile of snow, and so he has to ask, “How long have you known?”_ _

__Moriarty doesn’t waste any time replying. “About a week. Eight days, to be precise. Don’t tell me you thought I didn’t have people to, ah, check up on you and your lovely wife. That PE teacher has excellent taste.”_ _

__The snow in Greg’s bowels heats up, boils, and his entire body tenses under the sensation. “Stop,” he orders, voice forceful--his police voice. It’s the kind of voice he uses when suspects won’t tell the truth, or when drunk teenagers think they’re being clever._ _

__“You left without getting your note,” Moriarty says instead, seeming to allow a change in subject. “We will have to meet up again so you can get it. Wouldn’t want the Yard to get the short end of this deal.”_ _

__“You’re not afraid I’ll ruin another one of your suits?” Greg asks, the distance the phone offers making him braver than normal._ _

__Moriarty breaths into the phone, and Greg can’t tell what sort of expression that breathing belongs to. “You know better than to do that again, pet,” Moriarty says, voice lower than before. It’s so low that it feels like a cold finger over the nape of his neck._ _

__“Do I?” Greg shifts in the bed, rolls his shoulders out, gets comfortable._ _

__“Yes, you do.” His voice is a purr now. “You also know better than to wear that suit ever again. I’ll send you one if I have to, but you will not wear that suit ever again. Will you?” Moriarty asks, edge to his voice, the claws with the purr._ _

__“No,” Greg replies, “I won’t.” Saying that seems to calm his nerves, at least enough for his eyes to slowly shut._ _

__Moriarty laughs again, more of a smug snicker than a giggle. “Good boy,” he replies, and it’s the second to last thing Greg expected. The first thing he didn’t expect was the way in which those two words send a zing of electricity from his neck down to his tailbone. “You always look better when you do what you’re told.”_ _

__Greg flexes his toes, hears the joints crack. This is new territory, dangerous territory. For god’s sake, his wife is in bed next to him. But Moriarty’s voice is in his ear, as dark as a bad idea, and behind his eyelids Greg can still see the man’s face, the way he looked in that suit before Greg threw whiskey all over it. But he can also see that envelope, the white harbinger of doom, and it grows and grows behind his eyes until all he can see is vivid, painful white._ _

__“Do you think so?” Greg meant to say it soft and slow as well, but the words come out rushed, panicky, and then Moriarty is laughing again._ _

__“Oh inspector, do you really think I picked you only because you’re so outstanding at your job? Is that what you want to hear?” he asks. “Are you really lying in bed, next to your wife, wanting me to tell you all the depraved things I would do to you?” With the way he says it, Greg is expecting to be chastised. He expects Moriarty to scorn the idea, hang up on him, put an end to this and pull them back from the dangerous precipice they’re so precariously perched on. What he doesn’t expect is, “The first thing I would do is cut that suit right off of you.”_ _

__It’s not an idea that Greg has ever thought of before, someone cutting off his clothes, but his cock stirs nonetheless._ _

__“But not before I tied you down to the bed. _Then_ I would cut that suit off you, get you nice and naked. And maybe my hand would slip,” Moriarty adds. “I’d love to see your skin with a few sharp, red lines on it, knowing I put them there.”_ _

__Greg shifts under the sheets. His hand, which had been up by his chest, moves down--not to his cock, not yet, but to hip, waiting. He doesn’t say anything, but Moriarty hasn’t _asked_ him to say anything, so Greg assumes it’s alright. _ _

__“I could lick the blood off your chest,” Moriarty says, and there’s a change in the timbre of his voice, like he’s just walked up a large flight of stairs. Lick all the way up until I got to your shoulders, and then bite down. Do you think I could make you bleed that way too?” Moriarty asks._ _

__“Yes,” Greg whines out, as soft as he can. There’s a lull in the conversation after that, and in it Greg can hear his wife’s even breathing; she’s still asleep, and Greg can feel a phantom pain on his shoulder as if Moriarty actually bit it._ _

__There’s a rustling noise over the phone, as if Moriarty is getting settled down somewhere. “But that’s not really what you want, is it?” he asks, as if he already knows the answer. Of course Moriarty already knows the answer. “You want me to _touch_ you. I could scratch my nails down your back, kiss your neck--I bet you’d like that.”_ _

__He tries not to, but Greg reacts to each word as if it’s a touch, back arching and twisting his neck around as if he can chase down the verbal caresses. It’s heating up under the blankets, but Greg doesn’t want to move, can’t risk adjusting them. His hand moves closer to his cock, still not daring to take the game this far, as if he hasn’t already crossed the point of no return._ _

__“Or I could let you touch me,” Moriarty adds, with all the sureness of a man who knows he has the upper hand. And when Greg gasps at the idea, Moriarty takes a deep breath. “Well, not really,” he amends, voice tight. “I want to keep you all tied up and bleeding for me. But maybe I would straddle your chest, let you get a taste of my cock and smear the blood on your chest with my thighs.”_ _

__Moriarty says it like a question, and Greg’s answer is to push his hand past his pants and finally touch himself, fisting his cock and stroking himself like he’ll die if he doesn’t. “More,” he whispers into the phone, squeezing his eyes shut tighter._ _

__“Didn’t know you’d be so desperate for it, pet,” Moriarty replies, and whether or not it’s all in Greg’s mind, it doesn’t matter--he wants to believe he can hear Moriarty falling apart too, and so that’s what Greg hears. “I bet I could pull your hair and fuck your mouth until I came all over you, and you’d only beg for more, so greedy for my cock.”_ _

__Greg’s orgasm hits him without warning, and he has to turn his head into the pillow to cover his moans as he strokes himself through it, come coating his hand and the inside of his pants at the idea of Moriarty fucking his mouth and calling him greedy. Greg lays there for a moment after, catching his breath and trying to regulate his breathing with Sharon’s, who’s still on the other side of the bed, asleep, after Greg got off listening to Moriarty inform him of what he wants to do with him.  
When Greg finally picks up his mobile again, the conversation has ended. _Probably for the best_ , Greg thinks, getting to his feet. His legs are unstable, shaking from the aftershocks of the orgasm, but he makes it to the small bathroom, shuts the door, and loses himself in the soothing repetition of a shower. It feels like a return to normalcy, washing away everything from the day and, more importantly, everything from the night. _ _

__So it’s a surprise when Greg sees his mobile lit up on the bed once he gets back to the bedroom, indicating that he has a text message. He tells himself he doesn’t want to, doesn’t need to open it, but his curiosity gets the better of him. As he stands at his side of the bed, looking over the sleeping form of his wife, Greg reads the text message._ _

___If you would like to play again, you know how to get ahold of me. And wear the suit._ _ _

__Greg doesn’t reply. Instead he crawls into bed, exhausted and aching and full of the awareness that he is, in so many ways, truly fucked._ _


End file.
